Lightning stared at herself in the mirror as she changed into her workout clothes. A cold, sinking feeling spread throughout the pit of her stomach as her eyes landed on the skin above her breast. Her brand had been progressing much quicker than usual over the past few days. The marking had spouted a few more arrows and was now darker and more prominent in color. It was as if the fal'Cie had heard about their plan of rebellion and was trying to make a statement. "Saving the world… saving the world… saving the world…" she quietly repeated under her breath as she pulled a sports bra over her head.

Ever since the meeting that she and the rest of the l'Cie crew had had in the bleachers, she seemed to need more and more encouraging to convince herself not to spill the beans to her father about everything that had befallen them. As frightened as she was, she kept trying to tell herself that there were more important things to keep in mind, like the fate of the planet.

Telling her dad about the l'Cie issue meant telling him about Fang and Vanille. Although it was still unclear to her what her own place in the fal'Cie's master plan might be, at least one piece of the puzzle was clear: Fang and Vanille were supposed to destroy their world. And from what they had been told, the key to unleashing the destructive monster, Ragnarok, was to make one of them extremely angry. If her father found out that Fang and Vanille were such dangerous l'Cie, she had a feeling that the reservation would be swarming with PSICOM soldiers within the hour, which could push Fang into an angry rage… possibly leading to the destruction of the world. That, or she could be caught and tranquilized, and probably be brought before the Primarch in Eden, where the fal'Cie might've been wanting her to go in the first place… possibly leading to the destruction of the world. Or her father could order the simplest solution, which would be to send in a hitman to quickly and quietly dispose of both Fang and Vanille before they even knew what hit them…

Lightning paused as she thought over that scenario. It wouldn't lead to the destruction of the world, but it wasn't an option.

DINGDONG!

Light looked over her shoulder to the closed bathroom door. The group was supposed to go to the practice field today to do some drills and exercises. The Cocoonians' regimen was more or less the same. They continued to train as they usually did, trying to push themselves to new limits and figure out the best ways to use their powers if they had to in combat. Fang and Vanille's training, however, had shifted to be less combative and more peaceful, aimed less at learning the different ways for them to use their powers and aimed more at just knowing how to control them and keep them at bay.

She pulled on her shirt and left the bathroom to look for her shoes, sure that Serah would answer the door for her.

Fang leaned idly against the island in the kitchen as she silently waited for Lightning to come downstairs. Serah had answered the door but felt no need to entertain the houseguest because she immediately ran up the stairs, stating that Lightning would be down in a minute, right afterwards. Fang couldn't tell if the younger Farron was actually busy or if she was just looking for an excuse to get away from her. Fang doubted that Lightning had told Serah about the whole 'Ragnarok and destroyers of Cocoon' thing, but even without that, it was obvious that the younger teen was really skittish around her.

Fang huffed as she thought about it. Funnily enough, Serah wasn't the Farron who she had been having the most awkward moments with lately.

Fang had initially thought that things might become a bit easier after confessing the Ragnarok secret, but instead, everything seemed to go downhill the second after she had uttered the words, "It's us."

It felt as if the whole group dynamic had changed in that exact moment. It had stopped being all-for-one and one-for-all, and had instead turned into a Ragnarok babysitting company. Her schedules were planned out days in advance, and they involved her and Vanille being surrounded by at least two other group members most of the time.

And of everyone in the group, the relationship between her and Lightning had changed the most. She was somewhat already used to being glared at and disregarded by the elder Farron, but now things had gotten even worse. Lightning had begun to ice her out completely. Even though they were technically around each other every day, they rarely, if ever, interacted with one another. They never stood next to each other. They barely spoke. And whenever Fang did catch Lightning looking her way, she would be met with a cold, distant gaze. She thought it could be easily surmised that of course a relationship would change after an argument that leads to your maybe-almost-girlfriend pinning you down to a metal bench and threatening to shock the life out of you, but that wasn't exactly it. When Lightning looked at her the way she did, it wasn't the look of seeing a monster… It was more of a look of betrayal, and Fang immediately missed the aggravated glares she used to get instead.

Fang wanted to get a chance to talk things over with Lightning, maybe get a chance to try and explain herself, but it was hard because alone time was now considered a rare commodity, and the conversation seemed too important a subject to call her over the phone to talk about. That's why she offered, or volunteered and rushed out of Snow's house before she could be followed, to walk across the street to get Lightning in the first place. That's also why she didn't mind Serah avoiding her as if she had the plague. It just meant a better chance for her and Lightning to be alone to talk. She figured there was little point in even trying to pursue a relationship anymore, but at least she could try to clear the air between them.

Fang's head lifted as she heard the door to the front of the house open. "So much for being alone…" she mumbled to herself, thinking that it was probably Hope or Vanille following her over to see what was taking so long.

Instead, Colonel Farron's tall frame filled the kitchen doorway, and Fang couldn't even pretend to be surprised.

"Afternoon, Mr. Farron," she said casually, not in any particular way moved by the man's arrival. After the week she had been having, she'd been finding it harder and harder to really be bothered about much anymore. "You're home early."

"Yun Fang," the colonel returned, looking around the kitchen curiously before turning to look to the stairs. "You're here by yourself?"

"Serah let me in but I'm not sure if Lightning knows I'm down here. We're supposed to train today."

"I know," Farron said, nodding. He looked to the stairs one more time before looking judiciously back down at Fang, almost as if he were examining her for something. "Well, while you wait, it would only be polite that I keep you company. It's not like we ever finished our last conversation, anyway."

"Sure."

"So I've been seeing more evidence of you being in my house lately," the colonel began, stepping up to the opposite side of the island.

Fang just lifted a tired eyebrow. He was right, in a way. It was the evidence of all of the l'Cie being in his house. Almost every evening, they came together at Lightning's to watch movies because between her and Snow, her place had the better selection. It was all just another way for the rest of the group to keep tags on Fang and Vanille as much as they possibly could.

"I take it that means that you and Claire have been getting closer."

"You could say that," Fang replied with a shrug. "It's starting to feel more like a convenience than anything else. …for training," Fang tacked on that last bit to answer the questioning look that Farron had thrown her way.

"Then I also take it that sparring with Claire must be a bit tougher than you expected," Farron mused, now leaning against the island just as Fang was, lifting one of his hands to slip into his jacket's breast pocket.

Fang followed his hand for only a brief moment before shrugging it off and looking back to her own hands that were clasping each other on the island. "Well, ya raised her to be a tough sparrer."

"I also raised her to spar against boys—"

Fang's eyes lifted to stare at Farron.

"—so you can't blame all of your training problems on me. I'm not even sure how the two of you have stayed sparring partners for so long with such different fighting styles. I'm sure there are more fitting partners for you out there. Ones that won't get hurt if they're caught off guard by your... differing techniques."

"I thought about it." Fang looked down to Farron's breast pocket again. He was definitely twirling something between his fingers in there, but once again she decided to pay the action no mind. "Circumstance more than anything else pulled us together," she sighed thoughtlessly, running a hand through her hair. The hand in Farron's pocket stilled and he switched his gaze, which previously seemed to be on Fang's wrist, to look over her face. "She probably would've ditched me long ago if she could've and I still can't think of a person I'd rather spar with." Fang pulled her hand from her hair and let out another deep breath as she once again realized that she was talking to Lightning's father. "I, uh, well… There's slim pickin' for people capable enough to handle sparring with your daughter, sir."

Farron just eyed Fang calculatingly. "I guess that just makes me lucky that she was able to find you, doesn't it?" he finally asked in an icy tone, pulling his hand out of his pocket and folding it with his other against the island counter.

Fang's eyebrows scrunched curiously. She wasn't sure when the conversation had taken a hostile turn, but once again she wasn't sure if she should be surprised. It was Colonel Farron who she was speaking to.

"Fang?" a soft voice spoke from the opposite side of the kitchen.

Both Fang and Farron looked up to see Lightning standing at the other side of the room with her gym bag slung over her shoulder. Neither had heard her enter.

"And Dad… you're home."

"For the time being," Farron answered, standing up and stepping away from the island. "There are some files from my study that I need to pick up. I see that you'll be out training today."

"Just like my schedule says." Lightning stepped further into the kitchen, occasionally glancing Fang's way as she got closer.

"Yes, well make sure you're home early. There's a new street cleaning initiative starting tonight that I don't want you to get caught in the middle of. So remember that old curfew that you had a year ago?"

Lightning nodded.

"It's back in effect."

"Yes, sir." Lightning turned to Fang and nodded towards the door. "Ready?"

"Yep." Fang quickly stepped around the island, giving Colonel Farron a short wave before following his daughter out of the house. Farron just took a slow, deep breath as he begrudgingly watched the two leave.

"I didn't expect you to be the one to get me," Lightning said quietly as they walked across the asphalt towards Snow's home. "Usually Hope comes over."

"Yeah, well I was given enough leeway where I'm allowed to cross streets by myself now," Fang lightly replied. "Who knows. By this time next week, I might be able to play with rounded scissors."

Lightning softly snorted in a chuckle, causing a small grin to tug at the corner of Fang's lips. "Listen, Light, I know we haven't—"

"There you are!" Snow called as he stepped out of his house ans looked across the sea of pavement. "It feels like we've been waiting all day! C'mon!"

Fang mumbled a Pulsian curse word under her breath as she and Lightning finished their walk across the street in silence.

There was never any privacy.

"So Lightning, what would you say if I said that I've got a proposition for you but I know you're going to refuse it?" Snow asked as he and Light stood by his car sipping from their water bottles.

Lightning gave Snow a dull look and took a long swallow. "I'd say that you answered your own question."

"Okay." Snow took a short moment to think of something new to ask. "Then what would you say if you could say something different than what you just said?"

Lightning now arched a jaded eyebrow at the blonde. "What is it, Snow?"

"The return of Superhero Night!"

"No."

"C'mon! It's been dead with me doing it all by myself," he groaned. "And it's not just for me. It's for Fang, too."

"What?"

"Lightning, just look at her. She's miserable."

Lightning turned to the center of the field where Fang and Vanille sat crossed legged in the grass, eyes closed and palms facing the sky in a spiritual exercise that Vanille claimed would help them gain more control over their bodies and souls while also relaxing the mind. As calm as their poses looked, sweat was visibly pouring down Fang's neck, and her face was scrunched up in an uncomfortable expression.

"Snow, you heard what they said. They're Ragnarok and she's the trigger to setting them both off. She looks miserable now, and your solution is to put her in a position where some street thug can shout an angry racial slur at her and cause her to blow up all of Cocoon?"

"No," Snow refuted in a shocked tone, although he hadn't really thought of the possible consequences of someone pissing Fang off in the streets. "I was just thinking that the more miserable she gets, angry slur or not, the more likely she is to pop. I mean, I know we've got to keep her in safe situations, but she's Fang. Too safe isn't a safe situation."

Lightning hated to admit it, but Snow had a point. Both of the Gran Pulsian girls had displayed small annoyances at being constantly watched and babied by the others, but of the two, it seemed to be irritating Fang the most. Vanille had turned towards religion to offset whatever feelings of guilt, remorse, or aggravation that she had towards her situation and the conspicuously monitored group outings that had been planned for them each day. Lightning would often catch her standing with her head bowed and eyes closed, quietly whispering something to herself with her pointer and pinky fingers crossed; Lightning sometimes even found herself amazed, and somewhat bothered, at how quickly Vanille's expressions could shift from serious and introspective while saying one of her little prayers to bright and peppy when she thought someone was paying attention to her. She had even started bringing more spiritual exercises, such as the one she was doing right now, for her and Fang to work on, during their training sessions. Fang, however, didn't seem as if she had found anything to help take some of that guilt and angst off of her shoulders. Instead, she quietly stewed, usually standing around with her arms crossed, staring off into nothing with half-lidded and broody eyes. It was this that probably worried Snow enough to make him want to resurrect Superhero Night.

"Can you at least think of a more controlled situation?"

"It will be a controlled situation!" Snow exclaimed in reply. "Remember that little girl who was taking pictures of me nabbing those purse thieves? Turns out she wasn't taking pictures. She was recording! And now I'm a net sensation!"

"What?" Lightning's face dropped. "You're on the net using your powers?!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Calm down. It looks pretty fake with the video quality, like the chairs have been visually effected and all, but still! I've got quite the following… and the fan club! I convinced Maqui to make me a radio to pick up this special frequency and spread a rumour online about how to get me to hear it. It's all small stuff, mostly used by little kids, like 'help me get my ball out the neighbor's yard' or things like that. We'll do small missions and get lots of praise. If nothing else, it should be a good ego booster for her."

Lightning stared at Snow judgmentally. "Oh, how Superhero Night has fallen…"

Snow returned by giving Lightning an unimpressed look and asking, "Are you going to agree to it or not?"

Lightning looked back to the center of the field where Fang was now leaning forward with her arms raised in a new stretch, her face looking as pained as ever.

"Okay," she relented, eliciting an excited whoop from Snow. "But only candy-coated errands, okay?"

"Gotcha!" Snow smiled victoriously. "And to make it even better, check this out." He turned to pop the trunk and reached in to pull out a scraggly looking cape and skinny black masks. "I got us costumes."

"Soooo…" Snow goaded, tapping Fang in the ribs with his elbow as the two of them walked through a dark alley between two restaurant buildings. "What'd you think of that? Cool, eh? Eh? Ehhh?"

"Yeah, yeah," Fang softly chuckled, lightly slapping away at Snow's intruding elbow. "It was cool… I guess. I never thought carrying six kids up a tree on my back would ever count as a superhero act though. One of 'em almost brought me down by yanking on the back of my mask too hard." Fang reached up to adjust said cloth mask that was wrapped around her head. "But I guess it was worth it for all the 'Thank ya, Miss Overbites' I got."

"And that's what we entered the game for," Snow replied with a smile. "Only way it could've been better was if Colonel Killjoy would stop being such a, well, killjoy…" Snow stopped walking as a dusty shroud of dirt and loose gravel rained down on him from above. "What? You're scaring our clients!"

Fang looked up to see Lightning's dark profile slowly sauntering along the roof of one of the buildings that she and Snow were walking between. She had been up there (on the roofs) nearly the entire night, following and supervising them from a distance. She almost seemed like a misplaced, ghostly shadow from the way the moon illuminated her silhouette and the skinny, red cape that flowed behind her as she walked across and hopped from rooftop to rooftop.

Fang lowered her head to look back down and pull at the sleeves that Snow had supplied for her costume. She kind of appreciated what the two were trying to do for her, but still, something about the whole situation didn't sit well with her. It was obvious that she had been demoted to now being a 'helping hand' for kids who weren't resourceful enough to solve their own problems around the city at night. It was even more unnerving to have Lightning following them around and observing them from up high, as if she were preparing herself to pounce at even the slightest hint that Fang might get out of line. Superhero Night wasn't much of crime ring bust to begin with, but this? This was borderline insulting.

"Incoming transmission!"

Fang shook her head to clear her thoughts, trying to remember that the other two were in fact trying to make her feel better about her situation with this whole Superhero Night farce. As she slowed to a stop, Snow brought the small radio up to his ear and played with the dial a bit. "Okay. So there's a small cat… stuck in a mid-sized tree… not sure I know this address."

"Will someone teach any of these goddamn kids how to climb?" Fang muttered, placing her hands on her hips.

"I think that corner is supposed be what, maybe four-five blocks that way?" Snow thought aloud. "I'll just use GPS. C'mon, Overbite! Duty awaits!"

Fang forced a small smile and fell into step behind Snow as he led the way, phone in hand, to their new destination.

Lightning let them get a head start before tailing them from her elevated vantage point. She couldn't tell exactly how well this whole 'feel good' stint was working from where she stood, but judging from Fang's slump-shouldered posture, she had a feeling that it wasn't having the fully intended effect, which in her mind, made sense. Superhero Night was a horrible idea even before it became rated G.

"And we make a right here…"

Lightning turned and took a few steps backwards to leap from the top of one building to the next. As they continued to travel, she turned her head to study her surroundings skeptically. The more they walked, the darker the area seemed to become.

She leaned to the side to cautiously peer over the roof's edge, down to where Fang and Snow were walking. Dull, yellow lights were sparsely stuck to the walls of each building, creating a murky glow that allowed Light to barely see the l'Cies' moving outlines.

She then brought her attention upwards again to look across the pebbled roof she was currently standing on. It stretched out far enough to the point where she couldn't even see the opposite edge, and a good ways ahead, a tall brick tower was shooting upwards out of the roof. Attached to the tower was a skinny, metal ladder and from the looks of it, the top seemed to be lined with barbed wire.

Lightning continued to walk, but kept her eyes on the brick, barbed wire tower ahead of her. It just seemed so peculiar. What type of building was this anyway?

Lightning moved to the edge of the roof once again to check on the other l'Cie below. The alley began to widen as the sides of the buildings started to slope further and further away from each other. It was now becoming even harder to see them because the low-powered lights, which were attached to the buildings' walls, were now being pulled further and further away as well. It didn't help that the black asphalt the two were walking on seemed to be absorbing the dull light rather than illuminating it…

Lightning slowed to a stop.

"Hey, guys," she called over the side of the building. "Captain Snowman, or whatever…"

"Whoa! You got my name right!"

Lightning looked back down the alley, towards the direction that Fang and Snow had walked from. It was a single, narrow pathway. No turnoffs or new entrances. She could take this moment to argue with Snow about the ignorance of the whole superhero name thing, but deep down she could feel that something else was totally off.

"How much further do we have to walk?"

"Excited, huh?" she heard Snow chuckle up. "Shouldn't be much longer. GPS has us reaching our destination in less than a minute."

Lightning turned her head to try and scope further down the direction that Snow and Fang were walking, but it was too dark for her to see anything. There was one thing she was certain of, though. With so much relatively new asphalt and an alley surrounded by two buildings big enough to block out most of the sunlight, they wouldn't be able to find a mid-sized tree growing anywhere within less than a minute's walking distance.

"Guys, we should turn—"

"Voila! We're here! I think."

Lightning leaned forward and squinted her eyes to look down into the alley, where she was now only able to vaguely see the tops of Fang and Snow's heads.

"What's down there?" she asked curiously.

"Nothin'," Fang drawled. "Just a dead end and a buncha scrap metal. I think we got punk'd."

Lightning continued to lean forward over the roof, resting her weight on one of her knees. "We should get out of here. Something about this place rubs me the wrong way," she called back down, stepping away from the roof's edge.

"Yeah, I agree. Maybe even call it a night," Snow returned. "I'm thinking pick up Hope and Vanille, then head to mine to catch a movie? Or maybe—huh?"

Lightning turned her head to stare at the roof's edge again.

"Fan—I mean, Overbite. Do you—do you hear—"

"Yeah. Yeah, I do…"

Lightning once again leaned further to look down into the alleyway, but this time she couldn't see anything or anyone, although she could definitely hear sharp clanking sounds resonating up from the end of the alley. "Hey? Something going on down there?" she asked, trying to strain her eyes to see something, anything down through the darkness.

"It's uh, I think it may, uh…" Fang's voice stammered from the below. "W-We should probably go. NOW."

"Huh?!" Lightning leaned even further over the rooftop just as a loud, screeching noise pierced the air, instantly making her recoil away from the ledge to clutch her head at the ears and grimace in pain. "Augghhhhh! What the hell was—" She froze in mid-sentence as two bright beams of light snapped on from the valley below and started to shakily rise up in height.

"What the…" she mouthed, her senses still reeling after being hit with the excruciatingly loud screech and suddenly blinding bright lights.

Another mechanical shriek brought her eyes back down over the edge of the roof and what she saw almost made her jaw drop.

A huge machine was unsteadily pushing itself up from the ground. Two big cogs spun and lifted to settle into the sides of the machine's body, which mainly looked to be comprised of a huge cab with two bright lights shining from the front of it. The sound of metal knocking and scraping against each other filled the area as two large, metal claws unfolded from the bottom of the cab to point forward.

Lightning felt glued to her spot as she looked down in surprise. That thing looked familiar. She had definitely seen it somewhere before…

Her spine stiffened as the memory suddenly popped to the forefront of her head.

She had seen it before. Well, maybe she hadn't exactly seen the thing itself, but she had definitely seen a miniature model of something quite similar to it before, not too long before she had even become a l'Cie… in a display case at the Vestige exhibit. She had no doubts about it. This was some sort of PSICOM armament, like a dreadnought of sorts.

They had to get out of there.

"GUYS!" she yelled, leaning to look further over the edge.

With the dreadnought now standing, lights blazing down the alley as it continued to pull itself together, it took no time for Lightning to immediately spot Snow and Fang. Both were lifting themselves up from crouching positions, seemingly recovering from being so close to the loud shriek that had filled the alley earlier, and stumbling around as they worked to regain their senses.

"Guys! Get out of there! Now—"

Lightning was cut off by another piercing screech of scraping metal as the dreadnought finished assembling itself and lifted to an even higher standing position, its large, claw-like arms clamping open and shut and as it swung them in the air.

Fang lightly hit the side of her head with the butt of her palm. She still felt disoriented from the unexpected flash of light that had been aimed straight at her face paired with a scream that felt like it had burst her eardrums. "Wha?" Her eyes finally adjusted to the brightness that she and Snow were covered in and saw the giant machine standing before them. "Uhhhhh…" was all she could get out, all of her coherent thoughts melting away as she blindly reached forward and grabbed Snow's arm to pull him back in the opposite direction down the alley.

"G-gotta! We gotta—" she continued to sputter as she started tumbling backwards in a rush to create as much distance between her and the huge piece of metal as she possibly could. It took no time for Snow to get his bearings, see the dreadnought, and get with the program. He quickly pivoted around and broke out into a sprint down the alley, which encouraged Fang to do the same.

Another loud screech filled the alley and a forceful tremor shook the ground. Fang felt herself lose her footing and stumble off to the side and into a wall as the earth trembled beneath her. "Huh?" She chanced a look behind her to peek at the large metal structure they were running away from and her eyes almost popped out of her head.

The thing was raising its claws to the air and quickly smashing them back down onto the ground. On its very next pound, a large crack broke through the asphalt. The dreadnought lifted its claws again to bring down to the ground, but this time when it made contact, the claws shot up at the same time that a large booming noise sounded, and the ground shook with a strange force. That crack was now growing, running down the alley just as Fang and Snow had been before they had gotten tripped up, and behind it, the rest of the asphalt began to crumble and sink.

"GO! GO! GO!"

Fang could barely hear Snow's yelling over the sound of her heart beating in her ears as a hand pushed at her shoulder to turn her around and her legs instinctively started running again.

But they wouldn't run fast enough.

That crack visibly shot ahead of them down the alley, and Fang could feel the asphalt crumbling and slipping away beneath her feet.

Up above, Lightning could only watch in horror as the huge dreadnought demolished the thin alley that her two comrades were trying to run down. She had to help them. She jumped to stand on top of the building's edge and looked down, her mind racing to think of a way to save Fang and Snow as they were being swallowed by the cave-in.

"Whoa! What's going on down—what? Oh, shit! We got them!"

Lightning's head flew upwards. She could hear an echoing yell over all of the commotion down below.

"We've got them! Page weaponry and tactics squads 1, 5, and 6! Report to Checkpoint Delta! We have interaction at Checkpoint Delta!"

Despite the acute pain in her head from the noise and lights that was making it hard for her to even think right now, Lightning tried to focus as best as she could on the brick tower. Someone was up there, and that someone was calling for backup.

Not wasting any more time to think, but just feeling the need to act, Lightning lifted her hands to point towards the top of the tower. She hadn't even noticed that they were already tingling and swirling with magic. She planted her feet in the pebbles as she pointed her open hands upward and let'er rip. At first she could only feel the surge of energy as a strong torrent of wind thrust upwards and in the direction that she thought she heard the voice sounding from, but in a short moment a small, but mighty, tornado had formed on the rooftop. Thousands of the tiny pebbles that had comprised the first layer of the roof's surface kicked up to whirl around amidst the strong gales of wind and produced a multitude of clacking sounds as they whipped against the sides of the tower.

She could vaguely hear a scream bleating through the wind as the swirl of tiny rocks continued to violently beat at the brick tower. The scream grew louder until it suddenly stopped and she immediately retracted her hands to investigate.

She ran to the base of the tower, her eyes flying upwards to scan the distance of the thing, hoping to see where the patrolman may have been perched. She wouldn't find the perch, but almost immediately stumbled upon the actual PSICOM soldier. He was splayed out on Lightning's level of the roof, unconscious and covered in small pebbles. The man's face was littered with small, bloody cuts, from pebbles cutting against his face, no doubt, and he seemed to be as still as a board. Lightning's breath caught in her throat as she dropped down to the man's side.

Thank Etro, he was still breathing… but only barely.

Light placed both of her hands, one atop the other, over the man's chest and watched as they began to glow green. Her palms started to gently rise and fall as the man began to take stronger breaths, but Lightning still wasn't sure whether it was safe or not to let go yet. She kept her hands on him so long that most of the scratches on his face had knit themselves back together, although the bloody mess still remained.

"Augh!" The man's eyes flew open as he took in a long, deep breath. "Where am—what's going… Huh?" The man's eyes flew frantically around until they landed on Lightning, or as he saw her: the masked person hovering over him in the dead of the night right after he had reported seeing l'Cie activity. "Ahh—"

Lightning quickly cocked her arm back to deliver a heavy blow to the side of the man's head.

"Shit!" she hissed, quickly shaking her hand in the air as the man's head unconsciously fell back down into the pebbles. Gods, her hand ached! She would probably have to heal—

"RAHHHHHH!" a raspy shout from over the side of the building brought her back to the problem at hand. Light jumped to her feet to run back over to the side of the building.

Down below, Fang rolled off to her side to dodge another incoming punch from one of the dreadnought's heavy claws. She groaned as a sharp pain shot up her leg. The dreadnought had totally wrecked the small alley that they had been trying to escape down, which led to the three of them fighting in a deep crater that was surrounded by and filled with sharp pointy shards of broken asphalt, one of which Fang had just sliced her leg on.

"Guys, we need to get out of here! Quick! More PSICOM soldiers are on their way!" she could hear Lightning shouting from above.

"Hate to be the bearer of obvious news, sweetheart!" Fang loudly huffed as she jumped backwards to avoid another swing from the dreadnought, "But we're kinda busy!"

"You're not getting angry, are you?"

"IS THAT SERIOUSLY WHAT YOU'RE THINKING OF N—Ahhhh!"

Fang hit the ground with a hard thud as Snow collided into her. A huge slab of asphalt whizzed over their heads, crashing into the crater's side behind them. "We need some help!" Snow called, quickly jumping back to his feet and pulling Fang up with him. "Like now! Move!"

Snow pushed Fang away, simultaneously jumping backwards as a mechanical fist shot between them in the space where they had been standing less than a second ago.

Lightning's face scrunched as she looked down at her struggling teammates. They definitely needed help, but if she were to jump down and join them, she'd be pretty much stuck in the same situation that they were all in.

"Keep him occupied! I wanna try something!" Fang yelled, heading towards the inside edge of the crater as Snow nodded and began taunting the huge machine.

Once he had gained the dreadnought's attention, Snow fired an elemental spell at the monster while Fang ran, or more like quickly hobbled, around it to run her hand along one of its legs while unleashing her own saboteur powers. She hadn't been expecting much, the thing not being an actual living creature and all, but as she hop-limped away she heard a strange creak, almost similar to the sounds she would hear at Sazh's shop after they would start a real piece of shit car. Fang's eyes widened in realization.

Her powers could affect machines, too.

"New plan!" she yelled at the top of her lungs, continuing to weave her way around the dreadnought as it tried to fry Snow alive with a flamethrower that was apparently installed inside one of its claws. "You two, throw everything ya've got at 'im! I think I can take down his defenses!"

Snow began shooting spells at the machine immediately. From above, Lightning wasn't sure if they should be spending any more time fighting this thing when more PSICOM operatives were on the way, but it wasn't exactly like she could argue with them right now, so she followed suit. All the while, Fang ran around the dreadnought, ducking and weaving its swinging arms to the best of her abilities, while reaching out whenever she could to plant her hand against the machine to afflict it with a new ailment.

After about the third or fourth touch, the dreadnought started making irregular cranking noises. Fang hobbled backwards near Snow as the mighty machine shakily lowered itself closer to the ground and emitted a low humming noise. "Huh?" Fang asked aloud, as steam started to pour out of some of the various pipe ends that hung off the dreadnought's body.

"It must be trying to recoup!" Light called from above. "Relentless assault!"

They didn't need any more encouragement than that. Snow lifted both hands to throw different spells at the machine while Fang used each of her hands to throw out multiple ruin spells. From the rooftop, Lightning continued to barrage the dreadnought with her own magic as well. With so much power being unleashed upon it, it didn't take long before the dreadnought began to violently shake and begin staggering backwards.

"Snow, keep him off-balance! Light, get ready for something big!" Fang called, balling her hands into shining white fists and breaking into a fast, limping run towards the dreadnought. When she had just about reached the dreadnought, she dipped back to slide just under it, and brought her hands together. "Ahhhh!" she yelled, just as a powerful blast of white energy shot up out of her hands and into the underbelly of the giant machine, rocketing it upwards. Lightning followed the machine's upward path with her eyes, keeping her hands tucked to her sides as she built up a powerful elemental spell, and just as the dreadnought lifted to be a little over the roof's level, she thrust her hands forward to unleash the powerful spell dead into the dreadnought's side.

One last mechanical shriek filled the air as the dreadnaught vaulted into the building opposite of Lightning, wrecking the building's side and falling to loudly collide into the ground, being followed by a number of the building's smashed bricks.

"I-I think it's about done." Snow was the first to speak, lowering his hands but still keeping his eyes intent on the fallen machine. "C'mon, Fang. I'll help you climb out of here."

"Nah, nah. I'm fine," Fang waved off as she limped to where Snow was standing, frequently peeping over her shoulder to watch the dreadnought with a keen eye. Something was up. Although it was now laid out across the shattered asphalt, covered in broken bricks, she could hear something churning deep inside it. Something that was causing a faint light to leak from its cracks.

"You sure? Your leg looks pretty—"

Fang's head suddenly whipped around and her two hands lit up as she pushed a weak ruinga spell upward into Snow's chest, causing him to fly out of the crater with a loud, "Oomph!"

It had happened so fast, so out-of-the-blue, that Lightning couldn't do anything but watch from her perch in shock as Snow went shooting back onto the level asphalt of the alley. She opened her mouth to speak but her attention was quickly snatched away by a bright orange glow coming from the other side of the crater. It was the dreadnought. The giant machine had started trembling as a bright light inside of it seemed to be fighting its way out. Lightning was mesmerized by its bright orange glow for only a moment, when her body filled with dread as she realized what it was doing.

It was about to self-destruct.

Lightning's stomach dropped and her head whipped back around to the last l'Cie standing in the center of the crater, whose arms loosely and dangled at her sides as she stared wide-eyed at the glowing machine that was lying not too far away from her.

"FAAANNNGGGGG!" Light yelled at the top of her lungs, rushing to lean over the edge of the roof.

The last thing that Lightning would see before the loud boom, blinding light, and forceful blast that knocked her back to the opposite side of the roof would be a dark blur hopping over the side of the crater to descend upon Fang.